A Garden to Play In

When we bought our northern home after moving to New Hampshire from Florida, I had the opportunity to learn a lot while tending my new garden. No more jasmine, crepe myrtles and camelias, I now had to learn about what grows in the north. Fortunately my yard was full of beauty. We moved into the house in May and already the forsythia and tulips were mostly gone by, but the following year I saw the full splendor of what we had in the yard. (My photo here.)

During that next summer (unexpectedly, my last one living there) I added to the plants and learned what many of them were. The tulips and daffodils were planted in the asparagus garden and yes, I enjoyed fresh asparagus throughout the summer. I added a bird bath and some feeders and enjoyed seeing the same types of northern birds I had grown up with come to eat.

That yard was a healthy combination of plants and wildlife. The many visiting birds ate the bugs to keep the pests at bay. I had plenty to do and enjoyed expanding on what was there. It was a good size yard with little limitations, and lots of well established plantings of all kinds (but no blue hydrangeas!).

I now live in a barren yard. There are trees and rocks and a couple of large shrubs – overgrown burning bush trees – in the front along with some holly. The front has a row of trees in the front which makes for a lot of shade so that is not a great place to garden. The back yard is narrow with a steep drop just beyond the deck so my gardening will have to be done in a long, narrow section. I spent many hours pulling out the blackberry briars growing out of control back there.

This place will be a challenge as there are not many wide open sunny gardening spaces. Without having a wide open yard that gets lots of sun, I don’t know what will happen here, but my old garden is an inspiration and it’s my goal to make this yard just as pretty and enjoyable.

Hello fellow gardener!

So this blog does not confuse the reader, I must explain myself.
The blog began when I lived in southern New Hampshire where I was inspired to photograph, and then grow my own, hydrangeas.
After eleven years up north, I recently moved back to Florida, where I had lived for 27 years previously.
Part of this blog is about northern gardening, but the recent posts have had to change to tropical gardening. It's all a learning experience for me, which I am delighted to be able to share with my readers.

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